HOUSTON — Amazon, Alphabet’s Google and Meta Platforms on Wednesday said they support efforts to at least triple nuclear energy worldwide by 2050.

The tech companies signed a pledge first adopted in December 2023 by more than 20 countries, including the U.S., at the U.N. Climate Change Conference. Financial institutions including Bank of America, Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley backed the pledge last year.

The pledge is nonbinding, but highlights the growing support for expanding nuclear power among leading industries, finance and governments.

Amazon, Google and Meta are increasingly important drivers of energy demand in the U.S. as they build out artificial intelligence centers. The tech sector is turning to nuclear power after concluding that renewables alone won’t provide enough reliable power for their energy needs.

Amazon and Google announced investments last October to help launch small nuclear reactors, technology still under development that the industry hopes will reduce the cost and timelines that have plagued new reactor builds in the U.S.

Meta issued a call in December for nuclear developers to submit proposals to help the tech company add up to four gigawatts of new nuclear in the U.S.

The pledge signed Wednesday was led by the World Nuclear Association on the sidelines of the CERAWeek by S&P Global energy conference in Houston.

China’s so-called “DeepSeek moment” is likely to be good news in the global race to develop artificial intelligence models that can carry out more complex tasks, according to Jean-Pascal Tricoire, chairman of French power-equipment maker Schneider Electric.

“I actually think its good news. We need AI at every level,” Tricoire told CNBC’s Steve Sedgwick at CONVERGE LIVE in Singapore on Wednesday.

“We need AI to optimize your whole enterprise at all levels, so that you can buy better, consume better, decide better, source better. To do all of this, we need models to operate on a smaller scale,” he added.

Tricoire said the emergence of Chinese AI app DeepSeek showed that AI models can achieve the same results as some of its more established U.S. rivals, but with a much smaller model.

It “will actually spread AI at all levels of the architecture much faster,” Tricoire said. He added that DeepSeek’s blockbuster R1 model would be “fantastic” for improving safety and reliability when deploying AI on dangerous equipment.

“The spread of AI models at every level of what we need is actually very good news,” Tricoire said.

His comments come shortly after Schneider Electric reported record sales and profits in 2024.

The company, which has been a big beneficiary of the artificial intelligence trend, raised its 2025 profit margin following robust fourth-quarter demand for data centers.

Shares of Schneider Electric rose 33% in 2024, following a 39% upswing in 2023. The Paris-listed stock is down around 7% year to date, however, with China’s recent AI push sparking concerns about AI investment and tech sector returns.

Data centers, which consume an ever-increasing amount of energy, represent a key piece of infrastructure behind modern-day cloud computing and AI applications.

— CNBC’s Ganesh Rao contributed to this report.

Struggling electric vehicle battery manufacturer Northvolt on Wednesday said it has filed for bankruptcy in Sweden.

The firm said it that it submitted the insolvency filing after an “exhaustive effort to explore all available means to secure a viable financial and operational future for the company.”

“Like many companies in the battery sector, Northvolt has experienced a series of compounding challenges in recent months that eroded its financial position, including rising capital costs, geopolitical instability, subsequent supply chain disruptions, and shifts in market demand,” Northvolt noted.

“Further to this backdrop, the company has faced significant internal challenges in its ramp-up of production, both in ways that were expected by engagement in what is a highly complex industry, and others which were unforeseen.”

Northvolt’s collapse into insolvency deals a major blow to Europe’s ambition to become self-sufficient and build out its own EV battery supply chain to catch up to China, which leads as the world’s largest market for electric vehicles by a wide margin.

The Swedish battery firm had been seeking financial support to continue its operations amid an ongoing Chapter 11 restructuring process in the United States, which it kicked off in November.

“Despite liquidity support from our lenders and key counterparties, the company was unable to secure the necessary financial conditions to continue in its current form,” Northvolt said Wednesday.

Northvolt said a Swedish court-appointed trustee will oversee the company’s bankruptcy process, including the sale of the business and its assets and settlement of outstanding obligations.